


The Darkness Of The Music Of The Night

by HalcyonFrost



Series: Gifts and Prompts [10]
Category: Le Fantôme de l'Opéra | Phantom of the Opera & Related Fandoms, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Theatre, M/M, Opera Singer Loki, Pining, Prompt Fill, Short One Shot, Singer Loki, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, Tumblr Ask Box Fic, phantom Tony Stark
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-29
Updated: 2019-03-29
Packaged: 2019-12-26 00:29:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18272147
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HalcyonFrost/pseuds/HalcyonFrost
Summary: There was no use in listening to the superstitions of his new theatre troupe, Loki thought, until he crossed paths with a phantom too unreal to believe.





	The Darkness Of The Music Of The Night

**Author's Note:**

> _Softly, deftly music shall caress you_   
>  _Hear it, feel it secretly possess you_   
>  _Open up your mind, let your fantasies unwind_   
>  _In this darkness that you know you cannot fight_   
>  _The darkness of the music of the night_
> 
> Originally on [Tumblr](http://halcyonfrost.tumblr.com/post/183784445707/through-a-song-i-bet-you-could-make-loads-of-gold) for the [prompt meme](http://halcyonfrost.tumblr.com/post/166475571936/the-way-you-said-i-love-you) "The way you said 'I love you'", this was #23: Through A Song! Only one more prompted prompt from this list. ;P

Loki didn't believe in ghosts. He didn’t believe in specters, superstitions, or curses either, so there was no reason he should trust the stories of a superstitious theater troupe that wove tales of a phantom haunting their beloved theater. In the three weeks he'd been there, he saw nothing, heard nothing more than the common creak and groan of a very old building settling in its foundations. The more he was told otherwise, the less Loki believed anything they said, and the less he believed, the more most of them stopped bothering to include him in much of anything beyond what was necessary. 

When Loki came to this troupe, his reputation followed - for good and for bad. On stage, he was known for his range and his fluidity, an actor with chops of which few others could compare, but his talent was as natural as it was honed, practiced, and drawn from experience. One couldn't fake emotional range; the best actors acted from experience - heartbreak, hurt, anger, it took pulling from the gut to pull it off, and Loki had experience aplenty in real emotions. That led directly to his reputation off stage - a right ponce that cared little for playing nice with jealous or simpering costars and didn't bother making connections when he knew he would only be disappointed with people who, at their core, were wholly uninteresting to him. A star of stage, and a joke behind the curtains, that was Loki. And it had taken little time before he finally stepped on someone's toes enough for them to do something about it. 

Loki expected words or looks, not harm. But then he was walking the set stage like he always did the night before rehearsal and he felt something thin like string pull across the front of his leg when he stepped forward around a prop. A horrible creak of something massive shifting followed, and Loki only could glance back before he was being thrown sideways to the ground. He turned over onto his back and found... someone standing over, a heavy stage prop against the stranger's back, and one that if it had hit Loki from behind as it would have if the stranger hadn't pushed him out of the way, surely Loki would have broken more than a few bones. But not this man. He was holding it up and staring down at Loki. Shocked and confused, Loki could only stare back. The stranger was dressed like an actor in costume, but the clothes were old, and no upcoming play Loki knew of featured a character that wore a mask hiding almost a third of their face across half of his forehead, over one eye, and partway down his cheek. 

So much for a haunted theater. This phantom was no ghost - he was real. And he just saved Loki a tremendous injury. 

It seemed an eternity of just watching each other, not even the sound of their breathing audible, long enough that Loki half wondered if this phantom was part of the prop. Until the Phantom's visible brow furrowed, his eye narrowed as he tilted his head, real as he regarded Loki with curiosity at Loki's lack of fear at such a sudden appearance. As soon as Loki even opened his mouth to speak though, no words could be managed before the Phantom was shrugging out from under the weight of the prop, letting it crash down beside Loki as the phantom dashed away on the other side of it, leaving the prop as a barrier to prevent any attempt to easily follow. Not that Loki had the awareness to follow or any idea what to do if he'd caught up to him when the Phantom stopped again. The only thing in Loki's mind was questions and one very cold and clear realization - maybe he should pay more attention to those superstitious theater tales.

The next day, when one of Loki's costars was injured in nearly the exact way that Loki had escaped, Loki was doubly sure the night before wasn't a fever dream. The mysterious Phantom was immediately blamed by the cast; he protected the theater, they said, took care of those that would disgrace the profession with ill will, and William resented Loki for showing him up in front of the director. William claimed he was going to do something about it, they said, and Loki wondered why he was only hearing about it now that something had been done to William. Loki tried to explain it to himself, that if others knew of William's intent, then perhaps another costar prevented the incident and saved Loki's life. Only to remember the sound of so heavy a piece cracking against the stage floor and how if it injured William and would have harmed Loki, it should have injured Loki's savior as well. Still, Loki studied every face of cast and crew member that he saw, looking for anyone that shared the appearance of the Phantom Loki saw, looking for anyone that would allow Loki to asssure himself that this was a ploy. Yet, not a one matched his phantom. Not a single person. And so Loki's puzzlement and paranoia worsened. 

Perhaps once should have taught Loki to watch himself, but playing nice didn't feel natural anymore, and so being himself got him in trouble. Loki never even saw the next attempt coming, only heard the next day of a corps actor being stabbed just down the hall from Loki's room, the same person that another actor had overheard threatening to take a knife to Loki.

Twice was enough, it seemed, and the other actors now treated Loki with caution and gave him distance, leaving Loki feeling more out of place than ever and more drawn to a mysterious avenging figure that knew more of Loki's costars' intentions than Loki did. He still performed his heart out, not letting their chattering behind their hands impede Loki's love for the stage, but he paid more attention now, looked for oddities, for traps, listened for clues and hints. Sometimes he felt eyes on him during rehearsal, eyes unlike the theater crew or cast. Sometimes he heard or saw movement from the corner of his eye that wasn't there when he turned to find it. Some nights so late that they bleed into early morning, he woke to a song like a siren's call drawing him from bed to seek out the singer as the voice echoed down long hallways and stairwells and behind walls where there were no doors. It always stopped before Loki could meet it, but the song still called to him long after, still rattling in his brain until Loki felt it a taunt or a dare even when the voice only ever sounded lost itself. 

If Loki couldn’t find the phantom in the flesh, he would find the Phantom in the past. To know where one was, one had to seek out where they had been. Finally, Loki started to really listen. 

The tales of the Phantom were everything Loki didn't believe in - a once-beloved actor with a voice and a face that entranced every audience, but something happened, the tales said, a curse that marred a beautiful face and sent the actor into hiding. He couldn’t escape his love of the theater though, and resurfaced as a ghost of himself decades later in the same theater he loved when he was amoung the living. It sounded ludicrous - not just the curse and the timeline, but the entire thing. Except Loki found a photo of the mysterious and handsome actor that had unexpectedly disappeared from stage more than half a century ago, and Loki knew it was the phantom he had first seen six weeks earlier. It was impossible; Loki hated it even as he tucked the picture into his pocket and brought it back with him, but he knew was he saw, and he knew what he still heard. He knew the phantom was real, and now Loki was going to prove it. To no one but himself. 

As the Phantom lured with his voice, so would Loki. Waiting until the dead of night - a time he often awoke to the Phantom's singing - Loki took to the stage. He sat in the middle, facing out to the empty auditorium and let his voice free, carrying out into the farthest space, the highest seat, up into the invisible catwalks over the curtains. He sang, and he waited, for the sensation of attention and eyes on him, waited for it to grow closer and enraptured, waited for the Phantom to get too close to run away. And when the aria finished, and the last note of Loki's voice had dissipated from the room, he still felt the gaze. 

"I know your name." He called out to no response for long, tense seconds.

Then, closer behind him than he thought: "No one knows. Not anymore." Speaking, his voice captured Loki just as easily as the Phantom's singing had. 

"Anthony. Anthony Stark. I found you. 

Loki swore he could feel the shock as much as the vague amusement radiating off the phantom behind him and the soft sound of a boot shifting the old wooden floorboards of the stage. Finally, so close it was a whisper less than an arm's length from Loki's back, "So you have. Perhaps you should know then that they called me 'Tony.'" 

Loki pivoted around, but his movements were too easy to predict, and by the time Loki was turned, he only saw the swish of the Phantom's cloak as he exited into the wings. He was long gone by the time Loki clambered to his feet to follow, but Loki was unperturbed. He _had_ found the phantom, and he wasn’t letting go. 

Weeks became months, and the nights of sirens' songs didn't fade, drawing each other out and away others. Tony had the voice of an angel of music, and Loki fell for the phantom more every day with a voice in his ears and a faded picture in his hands when not tucked into the breastpocket over his heart. Tony never let Loki find where Tony hid away, every attempt to follow only led Loki to walls or blocked doors, but Tony would always come when Loki sang by himself. As long as Loki kept his back to his Phantom, they could manage short conversations that would stop as soon as someone else drew near or Loki started to turn around. They spent time near each other, exchanged few words, but Tony resisted being seen for more than a fleeting glance. Yet, despite that, that Loki was graced with even the allowed company, it said much, much more. 

As time passed, it seemed to be forgotten by others that the phantom looked out for Loki. When Loki was given a coveted role, jealousy reigned once more, and one could not stand for it. The idea was that if Loki was out of the way, the role would go to them, but the logic was that of a mad man. Illogical or not, he wanted Loki dead, and tried to arrange a very fatal accident, naturally unbeknownst to Loki himself. The stage was full of accidents waiting to happen, and Loki was trying to bait the phantom out of hiding late at night when he heard the snap of a burgeoning rope a split second before a body was throwing itself against his, both of them falling back, and the last thing Loki remembered was a splitting pain when his head hit the floor. 

He'd gotten used to waking to music, but never so close. The room around him was unfamiliar but warm - a bed with sheets like silk covering him and candlelight on every surface of furniture that looked salvaged. The walls were old stone, foundations, but still Loki had few guesses as to where aside from somewhere deep under the theater. All he knew was that the music that echoed down here surrounded Loki like another blanket so comforting that he all at once wanted to bask in it and move to find who played it. And how they knew Loki's favorite song. 

Coaxing himself out of the bed, Loki followed the sound down a nearby corridor to another room, finding the phantom at a grand piano in visible disrepair. But despite the state, the melody and the tune were still perfect, still cared for even if it wasn't the prettiest thing anymore. Something beautiful could still be created from the unexpected. The irony was not lost on Loki. 

Luckily, the piano covered Loki's footsteps, allowed him closer than Tony ever allowed, and when Loki sat on the edge of the bench with his back to the keys, Tony actually startled, his playing coming to a discordant stop as he looked over to Loki in surprise. He was still wearing that mask, even in his apparent home, and Loki had so many questions why, but he started by opening his mouth and singing instead. Started where Tony left off, and Tony softened before he gradually resumed playing after a moment. The gravity of the moment didn't go unnoticed - Loki's voice and Tony's hands together in the depth of Tony's lair, filling the chamber with a love song, Tony's eyes on the piano while Loki's gaze was nowhere but Tony. 

When the last note fell and faded, they hadn't moved - Tony still stared downwards while Loki awaited his phantom's next move. After all, Loki knew his own feelings before he sat down to sing to Tony, but Loki was not yet sure of Tony's level of interest considering he spent as much time running away from Loki as time spent seeking him out, and it was sending some mixed signals. But finally, Tony glanced up, uncertainty and want and apprehension all wrapped up in the thin line of his lips, the clench of his jaw, the furrow of his brow over eyes dark and deep. There was a question in every line of his face, and Loki was willing to give some answers, provided he was given a few as well. 

Very cautiously, Loki raised his hands to Tony's face. Telegraphing his intentions, Loki gave Tony every opportunity to refuse, and while Tony did tense on realization, he didn’t escape this time. So with slightly trembling hands, Loki took hold of the mask and gently slipped it off. 

It seemed the mask was custom made for him - every inch of the third of Tony's usually covered face was a livid, blackened red like fire seeping from under burned, scarred skin. The sight was startling but somehow didn’t appear painful, even when Loki ever-so-lightly placed his hand to Tony's cheek. Despite appearances, it was mostly smooth aside from a faint pattern in the molten lines that crossed the discolored portion. Loki could almost imagine the lines continuing, paler and symmetrical, across the normal tones as well, but that might have been his eyes playing tricks on him again. It was warmer though, soft under the stroke of Loki's thumb, Tony's one brown eye and one ashy black eye looking as afraid as they were hopeful. Honestly, Loki had expected a much worse disfigurement, so seeing this was no grand surprise or repulsion. This was just Tony - his true face. And it was Loki's honor to be allowed to see it. 

Pulling a comforting smile, Loki cupped his other hand to the other side of Tony's face, felt him shudder at a touch he'd likely been deprived of for far too many years as he slowly closed his eyes and reopened them even more slowly. There was no question anymore: Tony was - had been for a very long time - undeniably, _Loki's_.

"There you are, my phantom."

Though far from the first time they'd spoken, it was the first time they'd done so close enough that Loki could see the spark in Tony's eyes at Loki's voice or the slow inhale as Tony pulled the slightest of smiles before speaking himself. "Seems you found me again, my Loki." 

Said like that, Loki thought his name sounded quite beautiful. The phantom was his, and he was the phantom's. It took Loki's breath away too. He hoped it wasn't a misread of the air when he leaned in and ever so slightly drew the phantom closer too, but Tony was already moving forward of his own volition until finally their lips touched in a gentle kiss, and all at once, Loki felt at home. The theater held his passion, but this man somehow held Loki's heart. Loki didn’t entirely know what to do with that, but he knew he was going to keep it - whatever it took to keep the phantom his and here.

**Author's Note:**

> I had a plan for a mini sequel that I never quite could manage to finish, but this part stands well on its own anyway, so here ya are~ 
> 
> **~ EXTRA NOTES ~**  
>  Tony's "curse" is only somewhat so. He crossed paths with a fire jotun that recognized Tony was an unrealized half-fire Jotun himself. When the Jotun asked for Tony's help and Tony turned away and refused him, the jotun cast a spell on Tony to show his blood heritage. (Yes, this is a Beauty and the Beast AU and a Phantom of the Opera AU, you're welcome) Well, the half-Jotun heritage, at least, thus the mottled skin. Tony was horrified and hid away, waiting to die, but Jotnar are longer lived, of course, so Tony kept on living and eventually resurfaced as the phantom of his opera house. The "curse" was about fifty years prior to Loki's arrival. 
> 
> Tony does tell Loki this story after a while, and Loki scoffs when Tony mentions magic, saying their talents - Tony's voice and Loki's versatility - is all skill, not magic. Tony makes a face and says that his curser mentioned that the magic in Jotun blood is so strong that even descendents tend to present gifts that show like incredible talents. A voice that can charm and ensnare anyone, maybe even an acting ability so talented that it's almost like shapeshifting... Loki brushes it off, of course, but Tony doesn't stop thinking about it, like, ever. 
> 
> And Tony does also show Loki the way into the hidden passages Tony uses too, as well as how to use them to get to Tony's hidey hole. They spend most nights together, playing quiet duets and sitting close together at Tony's piano, with Tony helping Loki practice for upcoming parts. Loki tends to get distracted when Tony sings though, and tbh, Tony does like to use that to his advantage sometimes. Loki also likes to use it as an excuse to draw Tony into more intimate moments. Tony does not mind this at all.


End file.
